Love is not murdered, as Caesar,
by traitors with knives in a moment of impetuous violence.
It cannot be slain so quickly
Trust, yes, fragile as it is to begin with
is easily caught unawares on the temple steps
and dispatched
but not so, Love
Nor is Love starved, for it can feed itself
Long after the supply line is cut, the wagons burned
their stores of Reason and Hope both consumed
still... still it meagerly festers on,
surviving on scraps and delusion.
When Love must be done away with
it is the worst of killings
it is strangled, smothered,
as an old man in his bed
by the heir apparent
when the time is fortuitous
which the heir will call "necessary"
Deeming it prudent to put an end to things
So it became 'necessary',
there was the decision
there was the decision
there the pillow, and the long sigh,
and the courageous self-convincing.
And then the pressure, soft and terrible,
but once begun, irreversible.
Because it struggles at first, and were the pillow lifted,
it would revive ten-fold and wreck revenge.
And in that fact is the need to continue what is begun.
Towards the end... so I think, at least,
towards the end it grows increasingly quiet
and though it twitches now and then,
spasms that pass through the heart,
regret, memory, wishful thinking,
slowly it grows awfully faint.
it loses potency
awfully. horribly. faint.
until it accepts the muffled darkness
and then is still...
So that one cold morning the shout goes up...
"The king is dead. Long live the king!"
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